METHODOLOGY Venture capital dealmaking includes minority equity investments, as PitchBook defines venture capital funds as pools of capital raised for well as investments combined of both equity and debt, into startup the purpose of investing in the equity of startup companies. In addition companies from an outside source. Investment does not necessarily to funds raised by traditional venture capital firms, PitchBook also have to be taken from an institutional investor. This can include includes funds raised by any institution with the primary intent stated investment from individual angel investors, angel groups, seed funds, above. Only funds based in the US that have held their final close are venture capital firms, corporate venture firms, and corporate investors, included in the fundraising numbers of this report. The entirety of a as well as from nontraditional investors such as hedge funds, mutual fund’s committed capital is attributed to the year of the final close of funds, or private equity funds. Investments received as part of an the fund. Interim close amounts are not recorded in the year of the accelerator program are not included; however, if the accelerator interim close. continues to invest in follow-on rounds, those further financings are included. Deal locations are categorized into specific combined statistical areas (CSAs) based on CSA definitions provided by the US Census Bureau. Dealmaking figures in this report reflect seed- and early-stage rounds. For example, the Austin CSA, which is not defined by the US Census Early-stage rounds are generally classified as Series A or B (which Bureau, is a combination of the Austin and San Antonio Metropolitan we typically aggregate together as early-stage) either by the series of Statistical Areas provided by the US Census Bureau. stock issued in the financing or, if that information is unavailable, by a series of factors including the age of the company, prior financing history, company status, participating investors, and more. As for seed, when the investors and/or press release state that a round is a seed financing, or it is for less than $500,000 and is the first round as reported by a government filing, it is classified as such. If angels are the only investors, then a round is only marked as seed if it is explicitly stated. 13 / Beyond Silicon Valley: Coastal dollars and local investors accelerate early-stage startup funding across the US
Beyond Silicon Valley | Rise of the Rest Page 12 Page 14